Strength
by write.sing.love
Summary: When Kensi's mother is the team's next case, will she be able to keep up? Can she hide her emotions for the good of the case? Can Deeks show her that it's ok to let her guard down every once in a while? Sorry, summary sucks. Story's better than it sounds. This is my first fic, so please review. I DO NOT OWN NCIS: LOS ANGELES. I ONLY OWN THE STUFF THAT YOU DON'T RECOGNIZE!
1. Chapter 1

"Morning!" Deeks called to his colleagues as he walked into the bullpen on Monday morning. He noted Kensi's absence and decided to ask her about it later.

"Morning!" Sam and Callen chorused back to him. The two senior agents already scared him, and he did not like the look they were giving him. "Where's Kensi?" Callen asked. He figured that Kensi and Deeks had carpooled, like they did a lot lately.

"You mean she's not here yet?" Deeks was confused, Kensi was always here on time, usually a little bit early, "Is she in the gym?"

"No. We thought she came with you," Sam butted in. He wondered where Miss I'm-Always-Here-Five-Minutes-Early was. Kensi and Deeks had been spending a lot of time together lately. He had noticed them going home together and he was sure that G had noticed, too.

Deeks was about to reply when he was cut off by the person in question herself, "Where were you?" Kensi punched her partner in the arm.

"Good morning to you, too, Sunshine," Deeks rubbed his arm where his partner had socked him. Why was she acting like this? She had finally gotten rid of her habit of punching him and now that was how she was going to say good morning?

"Because of you, I had to pay for a cab from LAX! You owe me $120!" Kensi slugged her partner again, ignoring his sounds of protest. Deeks was supposed to pick her up at the airport this morning, when she got back from D.C., but he never showed.

She was getting ready to start screaming at him again, but she was cut off by a shrill whistle. "We've got a case!" Eric called down to them, "And this is a bad one." Kensi raced up to Ops leaving a very scared-for-his-life Deeks behind. Sam and Callen followed her. Deeks finally snapped out of it and followed them.

"This woman was found just outside of a residential neighborhood about twenty minutes from here. She was brutally beaten and stabbed eleven times. All of the stabs were precisely placed to cause a lot of pain, but they were placed so that they wouldn't kill her. Cause of death was blunt-force trauma to the back of the head. She didn't have any form of ID and she didn't come up in facial recognition, so right now she's a Jane Doe," Nell briefed the team.

"So why is this our case, then?" Callen asked.

"Because she was carrying a NCIS guest access card for this building."

"Run her card through the logs. See if you can find out who she was visiting. Maybe that person can tell us who she was," Callen ordered.

"That won't be necessary," Kensi finally spoke up. Her voice was just above a whisper.

"Why not?" Callen wondered what Kensi knew that would tell them who this woman may have been.

Kensi looked up at the picture. She forced herself to stay strong, she could deal with her emotion later. "Because," Kensi's eyes filled with tears and she took a deep breath, preparing herself for what she was about to say, "She was my mother."


	2. Chapter 2

"Kens," Deeks was hesitant. He spoke softly, testing the waters.

"Don't," she snapped, "Just don't." Kensi sped out of the room, almost running into Hetty in the process. Before Hetty could say anything to her, Kensi was gone. "The guys probably think that I have a death wish," she thought. She grabbed a donut and sat down at her desk. Kensi was so confused. First she loved her mother, then hated her, then loved her again. Now her mom was gone and Kensi was a jumbled up mess up emotions. Love for her mom, pain for her mother's death, hatred for whoever did this, and she wasn't even going to get into what she felt for Deeks.

"Kensi?" Speak of the devil. She looked up at Deeks. "Are you sure you don't want to talk about it?"

"Yes."

"Are you still going to work the case?"

"Yes."

"Are you madly in love with the amazing hotness that is myself?"

"Yes." Deeks smirked. About two seconds later, Kensi realized what she said, "I mean no! Of course not! That would just be weird." She busied herself with making a cup of coffee, keeping her head down so that she couldn't see that she was lying.

"Kensi! I don't want you on this case!" Callen called to her from the bottom of the stairs. He was worried about her. Upstairs in ops was the first time he had seen her show any type of emotion in years.

All thoughts of her previous conversation with Deeks vanished as she took in what Callen said, "No way! I'm working this case!"

"You're emotionally unstable, Kens. It isn't safe for you or any of us for you to work this one."

"You don't get it! I have to find the guy who did this and put a bullet through his head! Or a knife through his neck. I'm flexible." Callen looked at her like she had grown another head. She needed closure. Kensi needed to know that the guy who did this was paying for what he did.

"G, let her work it. Deeks just has to keep a close eye on her. She'll be fine. She's a tough girl," Sam had somehow stayed calm through the argument. It was quite funny actually, he was usually on G's side and was quick to join in on arguments. He got a bit of a rush from them. The fast pace. The excitement.

Callen agreed to let Kensi work the case as long as she didn't look into anything without her partner. Deeks smirked again at Callen's words. Also, she had to stay with Deeks, just in case she was the next target.

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

The drive to Deeks' apartment was dead silent. Neither agent said a word. Both were thinking about their earlier conversation. Deeks had seen the tiniest glimmer of terror in Kensi's eyes when she realized what she had said. Then she had avoided looking at him, so she wouldn't giver herself away. Kensi knew that she couldn't lie to her partner. He put his trust in her, and it felt like she had been stabbed every time she lied to him. It was one of the things that she loved about Deeks, how honest she could be with him. Sure, he made a joke of it every time, but she had grown used to the jokes, and began to anticipate what he was going to say next.

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

"Ok, so you know the drill. Blankets are in the closet there, and I'll go get you a pillow," Deeks returned with a huge, fluffy pillow. "Night, Fern." He heard Kensi mutter something unintelligible, but it probably rhymes with grass-mole.

Kensi draped one of the blankets over Deeks' couch so she didn't wake up covered in Monty hair. "I need pajamas," she thought to herself, suddenly realizing what she was wearing. She was in hiking books, tight jeans, and a button down blouse. "Hey, Deeks," Kensi said opening the door, but she was cut short when she saw him. He was in just his jeans, probably changing into his pajamas. _Dang, he has a nice chest_. It was muscular and defined. He had a six pack and "the v", too. She knew that he was in shape, but she didn't know that he looked like a frickin' model.

Deeks noticed Kensi checking him out and smirked. "You like what you see?" Kensi opened her mouth to say something, but no sound came out. "Look at that, the infamous Kensi Blye is actally speechless. Someone alert the media."

"I'm sorry what?" Kensi snapped out of her trance. Deeks smirked, yet again. "Sorry, I got kinda distracted, you know, with my mom and all," she replied. The smirk was immediately wiped off of Deeks'. _Nice save, Kensi!_ "Anyways, do you have something that I could sleep in?" He gave her one of his t-shirts and a pair of basketball shorts. He made sure that they had ties, though, so she could fit them around her tiny waist.

Kensi changed into Deeks' clothes quickly and laid down on the couch. She wrapped herself in a thick blanket. Kensi buried her face into the fluffy pillow and inhaled deeply. She noticed that it smelled just like Deeks. _Sunshine, saltwater, and laundry detergent_.

**So that was Chapter 2! Let me know what you guys thought!**


	3. Chapter 3

Riiiing…riiiiing! Kensi groaned as she heard her phone going off. She picked it up. "What?!" she snapped to whoever was on the other end.

"Good morning to you, too, Miss Blye," Hetty's voice drifted into Kensi's ear. Kensi noted that Hetty sounded like she was hiding something "There has been a development of the case, we need you and Mr. Deeks at the boatshed as soon as poss-" Kensi hung up before Hetty could even finish, and ran to go wake up Deeks.

"Deeks! Get up! Hetty needs us at the boatshed!" The detective didn't even twitch. Kensi had a better idea. She pleaded with an imaginary intruder, "Please don't hurt me. I have no idea what you're talking about." Then she screamed. Deeks shot up out of bed, gun in hand. He turned to her with a ticked look on his face.

"Don't do that…just, don't _scare_ me like that, Kens," This was one of the few times I'd heard Deeks sound serious about something. Deeks went into his bathroom to get ready. Kensi put on the clothes that she kept at Deeks' house in case of situations like these. She put on a little bit of makeup and pulled her hair up into a ponytail to hide the fact that she hadn't washed it in two days. Within ten minutes both she and Deeks were on their way to work.

"Come with me, Agent Blye," Granger said as soon as she and Deeks had walked into the boatshed. He led her into the interrogation room. "Have a seat."

"That's where you sit if you're a suspect," Kensi put the pieces together. Why Granger was here, the funny tone of voice that Hetty had used earlier, "You don't actually think I killed my own mother!"

Granger didn't answer, "Where were you two nights on Sunday night between ten and two the next morning?"

Kensi didn't miss a beat, "At a club downtown. Go ask the bartender."

"We plan on it. Phone records show that you were the last person she called before her death."

"Yeah, phone records also show that she called me at about that time every night." Kensi was getting sick of this, "Haven't you learned your lesson from the last time you accused me of killing one of my parents?"

Granger still wasn't affected, "Witnesses say that they saw you leaving her house after an argument at about 9:45 pm. Why don't you tell me about that?"

"We got into a fight because she told me that she was getting married. I didn't even know that she was seeing anybody! After that I left and went straight to the club."

"Which club?"

"Bombshell. Can I go now?"

"We haven't found the murder weapon yet, so you're free to go for now."

"This is just wrong, guys," Deeks said for the millionth time within that hour. He, Callen, and Sam were searching Kensi's apartment. "I found another Twinkie wrapper," So far they had found about twelve.

"G, I got something!" Sam called from the kitchen. He held up a very thick notebook. "I think it's a diary or something."

"Memoir," Deeks corrected, remembering the time that he had read it himself. "I'm not reading that again. It's like a very sad, handwritten book. And Kensi nearly broke my arm when she found out that I had read it last time," he shuddered at the memory.

"The latest entry is from the night of the murder," Callen said, "It says: I swear to God I'm going to kill her!"

"That's enough to have Kensi taken back into custody," Sam sighed, "So who gets the painful job of taking her in?" Both of the senior agents turned to Deeks.

"What? No! I'll probably come back with three broken bones and you guys know Kensi's track record with kicking guys' junk!" Deeks winced at the thought of it.

"We'll have some ice packs waiting," Sam wasn't going to back down, Deeks could tell.

"I hate you guys."

**Sorry it's so short and took so long, but I've had some serious writer's block lately. So review telling me what you think as usual. I won't post another chapter until I have 15 reviews. **

**Love,**

_**Haylee**_


	4. Author's Apology

Hello lovely readers,

I realized that my last Author's note (at the end of the last chapter) may had come off as pushy and demanding. I wanted to apologize for that. I had just been having a really bad day. And when I say really bad, I mean _really_ bad. I've been having really bad writer's block lately. And when I saw that the numbers of reviews still hadn't changed I just kind of lost it a little bit. I just really want to hear what people think about my writing, because I'm still pretty young and new at this whole writing-for-other-people-to-read-it thing. I've loved to write since I was just a kid, but I'm pretty self-conscious and never let people read it before, so I don't know whether I'm any good or not. I realize that there is really no excuse for my behavior, but I'm apologizing anyway. I'm grateful for those of you who took the time to read this story and I want you guys to know that I don't take you for granted. I'm really sorry and I hope you guys can forgive me. I feel really bad about what I said. Also, I'm revoking the whole "15 reviews" thing, and the next chapter will be up as soon as I can get past this writer's block. Again, I'm really sorry. You guys have no idea how guilty I feel. I seriously love you guys.

Sososososos Sorry,

Haylee


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